flipped through a series of fuzzy channels and settled on the black and white movie station.
A movie called The Devil and Daniel Webster came on. I’d seen it before. A man cuts a deal with the devil in order to get rich. He becomes filthy rich at his town’s expense. Little by little, he loses control. The devil comes to collect. Daniel Webster, the hero, sues the devil for the man’s soul on the basis of his American citizenship.
“Would any of you ever sell your souls?” I asked.
“Sure, to be rich.” Stacey answered. “Besides I got a God-given American right to sell anything I want.”
“You don’t have any rights. Look at yourself. Not with a name like Sanchez,” Casey said.
“This isn’t Arizona—or Alabama,” Stacey shot back. I had opened a can of Sanchez. They bickered like two old ladies over coffee. I was sorry I’d asked.
“We better do some work if we ever want to get out of here,” I interrupted. I’m not sure why Casey and Stacey listened to me, but neither muttered another word. The pair leaned over their stacks of papers and scribbled.
“Wish it had been that easy an hour ago,” Josefina said.
I shrugged. My toes danced against the linoleum below. I stared at the paper in front of me. My fingers were warm and moist around the pencil. I looked over at Josefina’s letter. She’d written a standard Please help us / Thank you letter. I wondered how many Please help us / Thank you letters anyone should ever have to read. I tapped the tip of the eraser against my forehead until the words rattled out, and I began writing.
My name is Masi Burciaga. I am fifteen years old, and I have lived in Pig Park my whole life. My family owns a bakery here. We are among the few who didn’t move away when the American Lard Company closed down. That may change soon if we don’t find a way to bring people back.
So a bunch of us want to hang out, build a pyramid in the middle of Pig Park and save our neighborhood. Are you in?
I was rambling, but I didn’t care. I copied the text onto a clean sheet. I copied it again and again, changing the ‘dear whomever’ part each time. My knuckles turned white and a soft bump began to form on my middle finger.
When Colonel Franco came in and announced that we could go home, I jumped up and placed my stack of letters on his desk. I rushed upstairs and breathed in the thick hot air.
Josefina stood outside. She patted her face and winced. “I told you. It’s time to throw in the towel. This feels more like summer school than summer camp. These letters aren’t going to do anything. Who even reads letters written in pencil anymore? This isn’t nineteen ninety-two.”
“At least your skin will have time to heal,” I said. Once again, I didn’t know what else to say to her. I could see her point. She was right about the letters. I was sure they would end up under a pile of coffee-stained papers that everyone would forget.
I hadn’t escaped the bakery for this. If that boy from the park was real and came back, I would miss it. It was a silly thing to suddenly think about, so I didn’t say anything to Josefina. As much as I couldn’t bear to sit in Colonel Franco’s basement one more day, I also didn’t want Josefina to have another reason to throw in the towel. At least we were still together.
We walked to the south end of the park where we found the boys clearing the overgrown grass from an area marked off by blue duct tape, about eighty by eighty feet, a perfect square. It looked to be about one eighth of the park. They were also digging a trench along the tape.
Marcos looked up and jogged over to us. I caught myself eyeballing his biceps—the way they strained against the cotton of his shirt as he ran. What was it with me? Maybe the summer heat was making me boy crazy. I told myself not to stare.
“Did you miss me today, Masi?” His hand shot up and tucked his hair behind his ear.
“About as much as I missed scrubbing dishes,” I said, a little too quick.
“I think that’s a yes.”
Red inched up my cheeks. I changed the subject. “What are you doing tomorrow?”
“We’re digging out the rest of the trench along each side of the pyramid,” he said. Marcos grinned and ran back to where the other boys were still working.
“Your brother is weird.”
“Ugh. I can’t believe we’re related sometimes.” Josefina crossed her arms over her chest and paced back and forth. “Masi, I don’t want to shovel dirt any more than I want to write letters, but it would serve Casey and Stacey right if we figured out a way to get Colonel Franco to let us work outside again. They’re not going to be the reason everything changes for me. I get to decide.”
A smile crept onto my face. I didn’t care about Casey and Stacey. It only mattered that it made Josefina want to stick around for the time being. Everything would go back to normal once we saved Pig Park.
Chapter 8
My fingers tightened around the extra cookie cutter. I was tired of sweeping up crumbs and doing things that didn’t seem to matter, like writing. I waved the aluminum pig outline high in the air. “Can I help you, Dad? I already scrubbed the dishes?” I begged.
“Are your hands clean?” he asked.
I pushed my free hand up to his face. “My hands are just about clean. We’re only writing letters.” I couldn’t help complaining.
“Letters?”
“Yeah, boring stuff.”
“I’m sure Colonel Franco has his reasons.”
I looked at my dad for a second. I wanted to tell him all about Casey and the homemade neck brace, but I decided not to. I didn’t want to put the idea of me getting hurt in his head. It would just worry him. Then he wouldn’t want us at the park either.
“Don’t just stand there. Wash your hands.” My dad waved his rolling pin in a shoo away motion. “La, de, da…”
I moved to the sink.
The bell we put out when we left the front room unattended rang. My dad hurried out. I pushed the door a crack to see. Colonel Franco stood a few feet from my dad.
“Good afternoon, Tomás.” He nudged someone toward my dad. “This is a student of Dr. Vidales Casal. He’ll be staying with Jorge Peregrino at his warehouse for the summer.” I pinched myself. The boy from the park stood in the middle of the room wearing a red polo shirt this time.
“Nice to meet you, sir. I’m Felix Diaz.” Felix said. He grabbed my dad’s hand between his two hands and shook it. His voice was soft, not like Colonel Franco’s grating consonants and vowels.
“Dr. Vidales Casal’s university in New Mexico will give Felix school credit for volunteering. A couple of kids will be coming up from the school,” Colonel Franco continued.
“Masi, come here.” My dad pulled the door open. I was leaning against it. I lost my balance and
